[circlefavshape]

> having humans watch every citizen on camera instead of just using computers which even Asimov in the 1980s could see was laughably inefficient

1984 was published in 1949. It's a bit harsh to expect him to have anticipated computers

[TimorousBestie]

In addition, he was riffing on Jeremy Bentham’s panopticon, a hub-and-spoke style prison design with a single guard at the hub observing the prisoners in each spoke.

1984 imagines a telecom-enabled nationwide panopticon, which made for good speculative fiction in the 50’s (and also does now). Asimov wishes he had been that prescient.

[yogthos]

Read what Asimov says in his review, the whole idea is fundamentally absurd when you think about it for even a second.

[isx726552]

Asimov seems to have missed that the book does not claim that everyone is being watched at all times, but that everyone could be watched at any time, in any place, and that they have no way to know for sure if they are at any given moment. Therefore, they have to behave as if they are under surveillance at all times, just in case. It’s a very effective and practical means of control. See the famous panopticon concept. You don’t even need a guard in the tower, just the threat of one most of the time, and occasional random, unpredictable enforcement just often enough that the surveilled cannot relax. The cost of doing so is not impractical at all.

Asimov is missing an important point that is pretty clearly spelled out in the novel, and this severely weakens his critique. I find this pretty funny because he starts off the essay insinuating that others who claim to love the book haven’t read it. Same to you for hating it without having understood it, Asimov!

[paleotrope]

That review is hilarious.

"To summarise, then: George Orwell in 1984 was, in my opinion, engaging in a private feud with Stalinism, rather that attempting to forecast the future."

He really got it!

And shows how fundamentally Asimov misunderstands how totalitarian societies work. "Furthermore, he has a system of volunteer spies in which children report on their parents, and neighbours on each other. This cannot possibly work well since eventually everyone reports everyone else and it all has to be abandoned"